Word count for nonfiction books

Less than 100 pages and it becomes difficult for a printer to print the title of the book on the spine. If youve ever read a joke book or a book revolving around a humorous endeavor of some sort, it falls under this book category. A guide to writing that works for fiction and nonfiction provost, gary on. Here is everything writers need to know about novel word counts. Word count for novels and childrens books at the guide to literary agents blog. According to chuck sambuchino see below for word count. Speaking from the agenting end, we can usually tell a beginning novelist when their projects word count is outside conventional numbers. You would be wise to come close to these suggested. And man, people love to point out exceptionsand they always will. Pencilthin books on narrow topics that are under 50,000 words are quite common.

If yes, then most publishers still work on specific word count lengths for books so youll probably be aiming for around 60,00080,000 words for nonfiction. Apr 08, 2019 these word counts are my personal references they are not official, and do not include back matter, which is bonus material for the reader or information geared for parents, teachers, or older readers. One of the first challenges a writer faces is how to format a manuscript. Below are steps that will take you through how to format a nonfiction manuscript and make it industry standard. For average word counts based on genre, see this handy reference. Like novels, these books fall into the 70,000 to 120,000 word range.

Picture book word count, and other rules that are meant to. Still unsure of how long to make your nonfiction book. Jun 07, 2017 when talking about book length, its common to talk about word count rather than page count. Literary agent paula munier says a 90,000 word count is the sweet spot for debut fiction.

There are a few book word count guidelines for each genre, but these arent hard and fast rules. Most traditional publishers will place restrictions on an author and require that the manuscript not exceed a specified word count, unless special concessions are made. The most important thing here is to realize that there are always exceptions to these rules. If your intentions are to submit your manuscript to a publisher or an agent, please check their guidelines first as they may vary. Go out and find similar books to the one you want to write and figure out how many words are in the book. As always, be sure to keep it interesting so you can justify the word length. Feb 09, 2015 if you are currently working on your manuscript, youve probably wondered how long your book should be or what the word count of your manuscript should be. Sep 06, 2014 according to chuck sambuchino see below for word count. Search for word count totals in books word counters. After that, your agent will be able to help you more. A guide to writing that worksfor fiction and nonfiction provost, gary on.

A word count that is much lower than the acceptable range alerts the agent or editor that your novel or nonfiction book probably hasnt been adequately developed. The harry potter books are young adult titles, and ya publishers generally look for manuscripts in the 50,000 to 80,000word range. Neither too long nor too short, this book length signals a novelists competency and knowledge of the publishing market to prospective agents and editors. A word count that is much higher than the average range tells the agent or editor your work probably needs to be tightened. Picture books should never exceed words, they all agree. Aug 15, 2019 average word count for this book genre. But while books of all sizes have cracked the list at one point or another, the vast majority of. How many words in a novel and word counts for other types.

Long book length at the other end of the spectrum a book of 80,000 to 100,000 words has significant heft, 320400 pages. If you stick to these when youre writing your nonfiction book, youll be fine. Jun 12, 2009 as a nonfiction writer myself, i know this is tough. With that in mind, ive tried to put together the definitive post on word count for fiction novels, young adult, middle grade, childrens books and even memoir.

That means your manuscript must be at least 3540,000 words long. As for nonfiction books, the standard bestsellers have word counts similar to adult novels. Count up the total number of words on 10 random full lines from different. This information is important whether you are writing fiction or nonfiction. The minimum word count for nonfiction submissions is 10,000 words we may make an exception for a uniquely valuable book with fewer than 10,000 words. With digital as well as print books available, the length of books varies.

I just popped into my office and pulled a few books off the shelf. Generally speaking, traditional publishers expect completed nonfiction book manuscripts to be between. In todays age of technology, books are still adored by many. Word count for novels and books is something i dont think about too often until i travel to a writers conference, and then someone asks a simple, innocent question. I have compiled my own booklet, listing titles i have read with their respective word counts and reading levels. Learn how to differentiate between the two main book genres, fiction and nonfiction. I have often looked this up and got different results, which makes it very confusing. If you want to write a memoir, for example, look at four or five similar memoirs and determine their wordcount. When converting character counts to words, a measure of 5 or 6 characters to a word is generally used for english. Everything you need to know about novel word counts nathan. Minimum realistic word count of nonfiction book writing.

While its important that every story find its natural length, it takes time to develop an instinct as to what that length is. As a hybrid author, she also has published 17 books independently. I have therefore made some averages, based on what ive heard from publishers and agents at childrens book events, and from research and reading. The average nonfiction book is about 50,000 to 75,000 words, which is about 153 to 230 ebook pages. Come with us today as we explore the worlds of fiction and nonfiction books. If you want to write a memoir, for example, look at four or five similar memoirs and determine their word count. When it gets closer to 1,000, editors and agents may shy away. Given a standard font size of 11 and an average word count per page of 475 for a 6. Generally speaking, traditional publishers expect completed nonfiction book manuscripts to be between 50,000 to 75,000 words. In fact, word counts for these books run between 40,000 to 50,000 words.

If youve been struggling to increase your word count, read on. Once upon a time amazon offered text stats for a majority of their books, which included word count. In my opinion, if your nonfiction book is fewer than about 30,000 words 120 pages, it does not feel substantial enough to be real book. Our word count tool site offers useful tools for your creative writing. Of course, rules are made to be broken, especially in literature. Average word count ranges from 70,000 to 100,000 words, although biographies of major celebrities or public figures can support a higher number. For nonfiction books, word count guidelines are more flexible, sometimes even double the word counts listed here. Why word count matters when you submit your book the artful. From picture books to ya information to get you started at. Build your book format a paperback manuscript word for. Your approximate word count to the nearest hundred should be just below the authors name on the title page. Apr 08, 2020 in fact, word counts for these books run between 40,000 to 50,000 words. A single novel can be longer, but once the length is above 110,000 words publishers may look at cutting it back, unless it is a particular kind of book books over the 110k word count are usually considered epics. The best thing that you can do is look over comparable books and try to judge word count by their size, average wordspage, and illustration content.

Any selfhelp or motivational nonfiction book should be between 30,000 and 70,000 words. My wife just picked up that gift book called grandmas dead. She is a nonfiction book editor and doctor, proposal consultant, and an author coach and trainer as well as a book and blog coach. Minimum realistic word count of nonfiction book writing stack. I advise authors to ignore word counts when writing. Although amazon stopped offering this for new books several years ago, the feature still remained for older books. The importance of word count has been beaten into me by conference speakers, submission guidelines, critiques, and myriad books on craft. This is a lot harder because its not a specific field im receiving back i have to scrape the results and do some crazy parsing of the data.

As with picture books, nonfiction mg and ya usually have higher word counts than fiction. As a nonfiction writer myself, i know this is tough. You might say, but with ebooks the word count doesnt matter. If you are currently working on your manuscript, youve probably wondered how long your book should be or what the word count of your manuscript should be. In the meantime, overwriting to the point that your draft exceeds typical word count ranges is a common issue and those widelyaccepted ranges arent completely arbitrary. When writing a longer book that is aimed at 12yearolds and could maybe be considered tween, using the term upper middle grade is.

How to use meditation to increase your creativity and word. For nonfiction, the people who say a book should be however long it needs to be are absolutely right. In 2017, the downward trend has continued, with an average book length of 273 pages. Mar 25, 2020 when you quiet the mental chatter, you become more creative and increase your ability to produce more words each day. Apr 23, 2018 this post covers why word count matters for novels, the standard word count ranges for various genres, and the word counts of some famous novels. Of course, you can also check out publishers submission guidelines for direction. I swear i must get a question a week relating to word count. Better to have solid, clear information than rambling to make a page count. As for non fiction books, the standard bestsellers have word counts similar to adult novels.

How to use meditation to increase your creativity and word count. As a reader i love the huge word count novels steven king has written and the very short gems tom robbins has penned. Apr 07, 2014 generally speaking, traditional publishers expect completed nonfiction book manuscripts to be between 50,000 to 75,000 words. In 2011, the average length of a bestselling nonfiction book was 467 pages, but that dropped to 273 pages in 2017. Oct 17, 2018 if you prefer to have a range in mind, research nonfiction books that are similar to yours to get a better idea of the typical length you should be aiming for. Although they are very different, each one has its own unique set of characteristics and purposes. A guide to writing that works for fiction and nonfiction.

These word counts are my personal references they are not official, and do not include back matter, which is bonus material for the reader or information geared for parents, teachers, or older readers. Your guide to book word counts fiction and nonfiction. May 14, 2018 literary agent paula munier says a 90,000 word count is the sweet spot for debut fiction. Word count for famous novels organized by hawthorn mineart, under books, writing. For debut books in this field the average word count tends to be 35k and it has therefore become the marker many industry professionals look for in queries from new writers. Word count for famous novels, in ascending order by number of words. Breaking bad news with baby animals, which is filled with pictures of cute animals and only one line of terrible news every two pages. Jul 24, 2009 in other words, its about figuring page space and not word count.

However, there is a wide range of acceptable word counts for non fiction books. I own those, and ive flipped around, but i didnt read them really. Aug 20, 2012 nonfiction selfhelp or christian living generally are about 40,00050,000 words long. However, there is a wide range of acceptable word counts for nonfiction books.

A recommended wordcount might be 15002000 words but, more. Deconstructing five spooky picture books with spoilers and word counts. However, occasionally very short books are published, such as harry frankfurts on bullshit, at 67 small pages with very wide margins about 110 wdspage. In 2015, the drop resumed as the average fell to 345. Word count matters more than it should in my opinion. Id guesstimate that nonfiction books generally yes, this is very rough run perhaps 150450 pages, and at about 350 wdpage that works out to something like 50150k words. Books in this genre are also often gag gifts or are meant to be facetious. Jun 15, 2017 this is a general list of age categories and word counts for childrens books. We publish nonfiction books that are unique, valuable, educational, and entertaining. This isnt to say that long books are no longer succeeding. So you may not want to tempt fate on the shortshortshort end of the scale. We are currently accepting submissions for nonfiction books in all major markets and niches. Middle grade is from 20,000 55,000, depending on the subject matter and age range, and the word count of these books has been trending up in recent years. What is a reasonable estimate for the minimum length, in word count, for a nonfiction book.

Nonfiction selfhelp or christian living generally are about 40,00050,000 words long. Its an endless discussion here, on the blogs of other agents and on writing loops and boards, so while ive posted on this before im going to try to make this the complete guide to word count post, everything you need to know. Word count matters because every book, regardless of genre, has an inherent contract with the reader. Rowlings recordbreaking series began with two titles on the high end of that spectrum and finished with five that left the guidelines in the dust. The lower end of the word count is for preteen and young teens, while the higher words counts are for older teens through young twentysomethings. Like novels, these books fall into the 70,000 to 120,000word range. Word count is commonly used by translators to determine the price of a translation job. Even with the wiggle room allowed by ebooks, authors follow commonlyaccepted book word count. A guide to writing that worksfor fiction and nonfiction. How many words in a novel and word counts for other types of. And a 28,000 word manuscript is more like a booklet or novella of 90 pages. This means your book will be between 100 and 230 pages in total. May 07, 2018 and a 28,000 word manuscript is more like a booklet or novella of 90 pages. Using styles also saves you time because you dont have to format the font and spacing for each part of your book.

Unfortunately, amazon recently removed that feature as well. What is the ideal word count for a nonfiction book in the. Word counts may also be used to calculate measures of readability and to measure typing and reading speeds usually in words per minute. The best thing that you can do is look over comparable books and try to judge word count by their. Now, they dont offer word count or running time for books, but they do have a search api. Generally a 50,000word novel would be the minimum word count. If you prefer to have a range in mind, research nonfiction books that are similar to yours to get a better idea of the typical length you should be aiming for. Picture book word count, and other rules that are meant to be.

The importance of word count has been beaten into me by conference speakers, submission. Sep 24, 2019 young adult ya books are written for ages 12 and up. Using the styles function in word can help you ensure your books font and spacing is consistent. Jul 23, 2012 still unsure of how long to make your nonfiction book. Young adult ya books are written for ages 12 and up. How to format a nonfiction manuscript betterscribe. That being said, ive seen a lot of conflicting opinions from agents on how word count should be donewhether its using the word count key on your computer word processing program or counting pages. When talking about book length, its common to talk about word count. We analyzed the nyt bestsellers to see what the optimal length and word count is. Below are approximate word counts for kings published books. You can use the preset styles in microsoft word or modify them for a custom look. Counting chickens a few words about word counts at hope vestergaards site. We dont know if it is single spaced, double spaced, in a teensy sized font, or in giant print.